


Most Ardently

by rewmariewrites



Category: Fullmetal Alchemist - All Media Types, Pride and Prejudice & Related Fandoms
Genre: Al is Jane, Angst and Feels, Ed and Roy-centric but mentions of other characters, Ed is Lizzie, Hawkeye is Bingley, M/M, Pride and Prejudice 2005 based, Roy is Darcy, Swearing, The Rain Scene, Xingian Roy Mustang, let Ed say fuck, mentioned Edward Elric/Ling Yao, or like Xingian-Amestrian Roy Mustang
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-12
Updated: 2018-11-12
Packaged: 2019-08-22 13:08:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,708
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16598516
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rewmariewrites/pseuds/rewmariewrites
Summary: “I came to Miss Rockbell’s home with the singular desire to see you. I had to see you.”“Me?” Ed’s not sweating, you’re sweating. This can’t be happening. This is so uncomfortable.





	Most Ardently

**Author's Note:**

> based on:  
> https://www.imsdb.com/scripts/Pride-and-Prejudice.html  
> http://rewmariewrites.tumblr.com/post/179904358202/roxilalonde-like-people-always-reference-pride

 

      Of course it’s fuckin’ raining.

      Ed had come into the park to think; learning from a stranger that the fuck-faced bastard he _absolutely hates_ has royally dicked over his younger brother kinda put him in a hell of a mood, and after those sixteen straight hours bumming angrily around Winry and Paninya’s automail workshop (where he’d trashed some scrap prosthetics, and _maybe possibly_ the rest of the place too), they had chased him out with orders to not come back until he was capable of acting like a rational human being. There’s a reason he’s _still_ out here, braving the pouring rain instead of going back inside where there’s warm fire and hot drinks and his automail ports don’t _ache_ from the freezing damp.

      So Ed’s sitting here under the only cover he can find, mostly drenched because of this shitty fuckin’ rain, not even bothering to take off his damp-ass jacket, when he sees this little blob cresting over a hill in the distance. It gets closer, and closer, and Ed squints at it like that’ll make it make sense, until - _fuck it’s Mustang._

      (Mustang’s drenched, too, because he’s running towards Ed through the rain like some sort of dumbass Romantic bastard, and it makes him look _totally and completely like a drowned rat_ and _not fuckable at all_ and _wow that heavy breathing thing is really definitely un-sexy.)_

      Mustang slows down once he’s in Ed’s space, but he doesn’t stop moving. He paces around, all agitation, heavy breathing, and running his hands through his hair; this Mustang is _not_ the Mustang that Ed is used to seeing, and it’s honestly making him pretty fuckin’ nervous. This Mustang is weird and slightly manic and actually looks like he’s engaging in real-people emotions, which means that Ed is consciously bracing for some weird shit to happen.

      (Honestly, he’s maybe bracing to get punched a little too, because it’s not like that hasn’t happened before. Ed might, maybe, get punched by a decent amount of people. But _nothing_ could have prepared him for what happens next.)

      When Mustang finally speaks, his voice is _tortured._

      “Mister Elric, I have struggled in vain but I can bear it no longer. The past months have been a _torment.”_ Mustang’s face is flushed and his chest is heaving a little from the heavy breathing he’s doing, and the little bit of his chest that Ed can see is glistening, but that _definitely doesn’t_ distract him from the weird-ass things that Mustang’s saying, because he _fuckin’ hates_ Mustang. With the passion of _a thousand fuckin’ suns._ Just because Mustang’s the most gorgeous person Ed’s ever seen doesn’t mean that Mustang doesn’t have the shittiest personality in the _entirety_ of Amestris. The bastard looks like he’s about to pass out from sheer emotional exertion, and even though he and Ed haven’t spent _that_ much time together, they’ve been in the same spaces enough for Ed to know that Mustang doesn’t do emotion. Well, okay, he does emotion, but he doesn’t do _raw, unfettered_ emotion like this. It’s _weird._

      “I came to Miss Rockbell’s home with the singular desire to see you. I had to see you.”

      “Me?” Ed’s not sweating, _you’re_ sweating. This can’t be happening. This is _so uncomfortable._

      “I’ve fought against my better judgement, against the circumstances of your station, my own rank and circumstance - all of those things, I’m willing to put them aside. I ask you to end my agony.” Mustang is directly in front of Ed, now, close enough to just lean forward and _touch,_ and those dark eyes are staring right into Ed’s soul. His cheekbones could probably cut _glass._ But aside from that - aside from the confusing, contradictory signals that his body is giving him: _what?_ The _circumstances_ of Ed’s _station?_ What kind of _fucking bullshit is that?_

      But of course, what comes out of Ed’s traitorous fuckin’ mouth is: “I don’t understand.” He can’t look away from Mustang’s face. It’s kinda like watching a car wreck; you just can’t look away from all that beautiful burning fire, and all that twisted, scorched metal.

      Mustang’s lips press together until they’re nothing but a thin line. The manic look in his eyes gets more intense - he whirls around, stalking back into the rain and scrubbing both hands through his hair, hard. When he whirls back around the blue tails of his open military coat whip around his waist, and he marches back into Ed’s personal space. He can feel Mustang’s breath against his face, the water dripping off Mustang’s hair, the heat of his body.

      “I love you. Most ardently.”

       Ed’s brain goes static-white. He might actually cease to function as a human being - is that the _Gate_ he sees, way off in the distance? He hopes it is. He’d rather have a second encounter with the Gate than have this be a thing that is happening to him, right now, in this moment. Colonel Roy Mustang, in love with _him?_ When all that rat-bastard has done since the moment they met is belittle _(not that he’s actually small in any way, fuck you very much)_ and berate him? What kind of pea-brained, twisted, backwards logic did this dumbass have to employ to convince himself that he was _in love_ with Ed? _Barely tolerable_ , Mustang had called him, not even four months ago. And then - _and then!_ \- two months ago this fuckin’ prune of a man had gone and broken Al’s heart by breaking up a perfectly healthy, budding relationship between Al and Hawkeye.

      Distantly, as if from the bottom of a well, Ed hears himself say: “I understand that you have struggled, and that I have caused you pain. _Believe me_ , it was an unconscious effort.”

      Huh, so those manners Al drilled into him _did_ stick, in some capacity. It’s probably a good thing for Al to know that all he has to do to get Ed to be polite is to _completely shatter his understanding of the world._

      Mustang is standing very, very still. Ed can’t quite meet his eyes. The water from Mustang’s hair is hitting Ed’s clavicle and seeping, very slowly, into the fabric of his shirt.

      “Is this your reply?”

      Ed frowns. Did he not just - was that not a reply? Did he not respond to Mustang’s _completely fuckin’ insane statement_ in a relatively sane way? One that was polite, even though all Ed wants to do is _rip his balls off_ for purposefully ruining Al’s chances with Hawkeye? “Yeah, it is?”

      Mustang’s gaze gets sharper, and his hands twitch at his sides, like he _desperately_ wants to fidget. “Are you laughing at me?”

      “No?”

      “Are you rejecting me?”

      Wha - could this man be _any more dense?_ In _what world_ would Ed ever agree to marry _Roy Mustang?_

 _Then again,_ says a small voice in the back of Ed’s mind that sounds just a little too much like Al, _this is a world in which Roy Mustang wants to marry you, which you would have dismissed as impossible even yesterday._

      Ed takes a deep breath - then lets it out in a rush. He breathes in again, thinks better of what he was going to say, and breathes out very, very slowly. Mustang is _definitely_ twitching now. It’s mostly in his hands, and the way he keeps moving his shoulders like he wants to swirl dramatically around the little space Ed found to keep himself out of the rain.

      “I’m sure that your frankly shitty ‘better judgement’ will help you get over whatever feelings you think you’re having for me.”

      The colour drains slowly out of Mustang’s face. Ed can actually _see_ it happen - and isn’t that a scientific curiosity? The way that a face can be so flushed with heat and passion and embarrassment in one moment, and in the next, a single bad emotion drains all the blood away, leaving the face immediately sickly-looking.

      Mustang takes a stilted step back, then another, before jarring to a stop. He opens his mouth - closes it. Raises a hand - stops halfway in its path, reaching out to Ed - reroutes to drag through his wet hair. Breathes sharply in and out of his nose, eyes scrunching shut, and then he’s staring directly into Ed’s eyes again. Ed still can’t look away.

      “Might I ask why, that with so little endeavour at civility, I am thus repulsed?”

      See, this is another fuckin’ thing that Ed hates about Mustang: his pompous fuckin’ vocabulary gets ramped up to one hundred in scenarios where he’s uncomfortable, which is _always,_ and then no one can understand a damn word he’s saying. Or, Ed can’t, anyways. Al would say that’s more of a problem on Ed’s end than Mustang’s, which should say something about Ed, but Al’s not here right now so _fuck both of them._

      It surprises Ed, honestly surprises him, to realize that his own fingers are trembling with barely suppressed rage.

      “I might as well ask why you were so fuckin’ determined to insult me while you were telling me that you _love_ me. _Against your better fuckin’ judgement._ If I’m being rude in response to _that,_ I’d say I have a pretty damn good excuse-”

      Mustang honestly looks taken aback at Ed’s blatant offense, even as he interrupts: “Believe me, I didn’t mean -”

      “I have other reasons, too, and you damn well know it!”

      “What reasons?” He honestly has the _fucking gall_ to look offended at the thought that anyone might find the great Roy fuckin’ Mustang anything less than perfect.

      “Do you really think _anything_ would tempt me to marry you after you single-handedly destroyed, maybe _forever,_ the happiness of my little brother?”

      Mustang looks as if he’s been struck across the face, _hard._ It’s almost as satisfying as _actually_ punching him in the face.

      “Yeah, that’s right _Mustang,_ I know all about how you broke them up. You broke up a young couple - _in love_ \- and made them both _miserable._ Just _try_ to talk your way out of that one, bastard.”

      “I do not deny that I have done this,” is all Mustang says, his voice a whisper barely audible above the harsh fall of the rain.

      Ed can feel his mouth curling up into a snarl, can feel himself take a step forward so that he can invade Mustang’s personal space, staring up _(up, up)_ into his face. “Then. Why. Do. It.”

      “Because I believed your brother indifferent to the Lieutenant.”

_“Indifferent?”_

      “I watched them most carefully, and realized that her attraction was much deeper than his.”

      “Attraction - he’s fuckin’ _shy!”_

      “The Lieutenant is too modest, and was persuaded that he did not feel strongly enough for her.”

      “Because you fuckin’ _suggested it!”_

      “I did it for her own good.” Mustang’s voice is harsh, but there’s a waver there - sympathy? Regret? Emotion? Whatever it is, Ed ignores it, because he _literally does not care about Mustang’s feelings._

      This time it’s Ed who throws his hands in the air and stalks around their little dry-spot, _wishing_ that he could knock Mustang out with one definitive swing of his metal hand. “Al barely shows his true feelings to _me,_ and I’m the only family he has left!” But _that_ \- that makes Ed think of something, and alarm bells immeditaely go off in his head. “I bet you think that because it’s just us, because we’re pretty fuckin’ poor, money has something to do with Al’s wanting to get hitched to Hawkeye. She does have that hefty military paycheck.”

      Mustang is shaking his head, little droplets of water splashing on his own shoulders and misting across Ed’s face. “No! I would not do your brother the dishonour of suggesting - well, but it _was_ suggested -”

      Ed takes another _very_ controlled step forwards. They’re basically chest to chest - only centimeters separate them, now. _“What_ was suggested?”

      Mustang sighs, turns his body forty-five degrees away, then changes his mind and faces Ed again head-on. His eyes are closed. “It was made perfectly clear that an advantageous marriage -”

      “Did my _brother_ say that? With _his words?”_

      “... No.” Ed waits. He just _waits_ . He knows - oh he _knows_ \- that there will be a jab at his adopted family in here. His _family,_ which he and Al scraped and cobbled together from the scraps of families that were already so broken, so disparate. “There was, however - I have to admit, the matter of your family -”

      “What, that we’re dirt fuckin’ poor? That we’ve never seen Central in our lives? That my Granny’s a _lowly automail mechanic?”_

      “No! Well - it’s just - it’s more than that.”

_“I’m waiting.”_

      “It pains me to say this, but it was the lack of propriety shown by your adoptive Grandmother and sister. And the absence of your father, especially in light of your mother’s… demise. Forgive me.”

      Ed is _shaking_ with rage, head to toe. His fists are clenched so tight that the automail hand is creaking, and he can’t see except for two little pinpricks at the very center of his field of vision. Everything else is a haze of _red._

      “You and your brother I must exclude from this, of course…” If Ed could see, he’d probably see Mustang’s pained and imploring facial expression, the way his body fidgets as if he simultaneously wants to run to and away from Ed. If Ed could see, he’d probably see that Mustang is obviously going through some sort of fundamental turmoil.

      As it is, Ed is trying to _gut_ Mustang with his _eyes,_ so he misses like, all of that.

      “What about Ling Yao?” Ed bites out instead of launching himself at Mustang and pummeling him to a bloody pulp.

      “Ling Yao?”

      “Why’d you treat _him_ like a shitty piece of trash?”

      “You take an eager interest in that gentleman’s concerns.” Mustang’s voice immediately changes from brusque but earnest to hardened, sharpened steel. Jealousy, another person might say.

      Ed _is not blushing._ He might, _maybe,_ have a crush on Ling, but Mustang doesn’t need to know that. Besides, what Mustang did to Ling is _shitty,_ and Ed would definitely be mad at Mustang for it regardless of his feelings for Ling. “He told me about his shitty luck.”

      Mustang laughs, but the sound is hollow and humourless. “Oh yes, his misfortunes have been great indeed!”

      “You’ve ruined him like you’ve ruined Al, and you _still_ mock him?”

      Mustang finally gives into his anger, and his face curves in to a dangerous, predatory snarl. “So _this_ is your opinion of me. _Thank you,_ for explaining it so fully. Perhaps these perceived offences might have been overlooked, had your _pride_ not been hurt -”

_“My pride?”_

      “- by my _honesty_ in admitting my scruples about our relationship. Could you expect me to _rejoice_ in the inferiority of your circumstances?”

      “Oh, and these’re the words of a fuckin’ _gentleman?_ From the moment I met you, your _arrogance_ and _conceit,_ your selfish fuckin’ _disdain_ of other people’s feelings - it’s made me realize that you’re the last man in the entire fuckin’ _world_ that I would _ever_ marry.”

      Mustang actually physically recoils, and he stumbles another step backwards, out into the downpour. He’s gone even paler, if that’s possible; his skin looks like porcelain against the stark black of his hair, his eyebrows, his eyelashes.

      “Forgive me, sir, for taking up so much of your time.”

      And then he just - leaves.

      Mustang turns tail and flees back the way he came - over the sprawling lawns and hills of the park, until he’s nothing more than a blur against the ever-darkening landscape.

      Ed watches the whole time. When he finally can’t make out Mustang’s shape against the horizon any more, he scrubs the stubborn rain from his face. It’s fuckin’ _warm_ and _salty_ and _gross_ rain, and it hurts his eyes, and he doesn’t want it on his face or affecting his vision any more.

      When Ed finally makes his own way home - or, back to Winry’s, which is as close as he can get to a real _home_ nowadays - Winry takes one look at him and immediately starts stripping him out of his drenched and heavy layers.

      “What _happened?”_ She asks with poorly-concealed concern, forcing his red coat from his shoulders.

      “I was… caught off guard. That’s all.”

**Author's Note:**

> you can find me at rewmariewrites.tumblr.com! it used to be and-still-not-a-ginger, but I've switched some things up, so all my #progresscheck updates will be over on the new blog.
> 
> I'm maybe planning on doing a whole big thing with this FMA/P&P theme, but, like, I don't have anything written yet? Let me know if you'd enjoy a longer work like this :)


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